US Amazon Workers To Unionise
Throughout the year, we have reported on multiple occasions stories of the somewhat harsh conditions many at least feel they face at the many Amazon warehouses throughout the world. Long hours, strict deadlines and time monitoring on everything seems to be the common factor in all of the stories.
It does seem, however, that things might be coming to a bit of a head. In a report via The Verge, Amazon workers in New York are reportedly looking to form a trade union in the very near future to help improve working conditions.
Bad News For Amazon
The employees have said that they are looking to address the following issues:
- Safety concerns
- Lengthy unpaid security checks
- Unreasonable hourly quotas
- Insufficient breaks.
In regards to the security checks, we have heard stories in the past of working deliberately urinating into bins or bottles just so that they can avoid losing anything up to 30 minutes trying to get through security to go to the toilet.
Training Video
What will not have helped matters is the rumour of an in-house training video for managers. In it, the video seems to direct managers to specifically look to identify any evidence of ‘unionist’ behavior between the workers. The pretty horrific ‘TIPS’ acronym also appeared. Specifically; Threaten, Interrogate, Promise and Spy.
If this happens, it’s clearly against the wishes of Amazon whether the video was legitimate or not. It will be curious to see what happens in the coming months.
Amazon, of course, deny any allegations of providing an unsafe or a poor working environment.
What do you think? – Let us know in the comments!
